Degradation of ABS in ABS/CaCO₃ Composites during Reprocessing

Acrylonitrile-Butadiene-Styrene (ABS)/CaCO₃ composites were reprocessed under normal conditions. The effects of reprocessing on the degradation of ABS were investigated by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and gel permeation chromatography (GPC). The mechanical properties of the reprocessed materials were measured. In this paper, a method to evaluate the degradation of ABS in ABS/CaCO₃ composites by FTIR was described. The results show that within the range of the reprocessing cycles studied, as the number of reprocessing cycles increased, the impact strength of composite was significantly reduced if the content of CaCO₃ is lower than 10%, due to the degradation of rubber phase. However, the impact strength was almost unchanged when the content of CaCO₃ was higher than 15%.